Credentials

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Yes, my guard stood hard when abstract threats

Too noble to neglect

Deceived me into thinking

I had something to protect

Good and bad, I define these terms

Quite clear, no doubt, somehow

Ah, but I was so much older then

I'm younger than that now.

With age comes wisdom, not certainty.

If I could turn back time, I would tell my younger self that building a reputation was not vanity, was not self serving.  Your reputation provides you a platform.  Credentials provide you with credibility.  Getting a reputation and credentials may provide you with the means of promoting a good idea.  If you have a good idea and no one listens to that idea, that idea may be the best thing for society, but if no one listens to that idea, society can never act on or benefit from it.. 

Having credentials does not mean that you are always correct, but it does mean that you have a platform.  An idea needs to be heard before it can be put into action.

Alfred Wallace had the idea of evolution  at roughly the same time as Charles Darwin.  Darwin promoted his idea to an audience and that idea was eventually listened to and tested. How many Wallaces are out there out there who have good ideas that are not being acted upon.  Getting credentials and building your reputation does have a value to society, even if when you are young you don’t see that value.